Dinosaur Auntie Augments Reality
- dinosaurauntie2021
- Jul 6, 2021
- 2 min read
Considering the harshness of present day reality with Covid-19, this Dinosaur Auntie here was simply thrilled to find out that there was a course to learn how to augment reality.
According to the Oxford Languages dictionary online, “augment” means to make something greater by adding to it. So “Augmented Reality (AR)” improves what is already “here” in the real-world environment.
My first encounter with AR was reading about a new app Ikea created called “Ikea Place”, which lets you virtually “place” true-to-scale 3D Ikea products in your room to see if it fits the size of the space and goes with the overall look and feel.
This new immersive experience was like MAGIC to me. Just like “Breaking the Magician’s Code” which was my favourite reality TV show in the late 1990’s, I just had to find out how to conjure this magic trick called AR.
My discovery journey started with the introduction to “Marker Based AR”. Basically the way it works is that you must first download the augmented reality app into your mobile device. This app will enable your mobile device to scan markers which are static images such as a printed image, photo or a QR code. The mobile scan will then trigger additional content (video, animation, 3D etc) to appear on top of the marker.
It was an amazing experience learning how to create my very own augmented reality experiences and build my own app. I never imagined it was possible for me to do something like this. I was so thrilled to see a 3D penguin walking on my black and white printout.
Then I got a little braver and decided that my AR experience could do with more animals and more action, which led to this animation of polar bears scaring the living daylights of the poor penguins, with arctic birds flying overhead.
And then we were taught how to create multiple AR experiences using multiple markers. Confession time: if you look closely at the video, you will notice that my laptop is upside down. This has nothing to do with the school – the trainer will most certainly have freaked out if he had seen this happening in class. Dinosaur Auntie has to confess that she came up with this cave woman approach herself at home, beyond the reach and control of the trainer.
So could Dinosaur Auntie change her primitive ways to survive the AR course? Did she manage to pass the final test in the end? Stay tuned to the next episode to find out.
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